The Carpenter
by TerraZeal
Summary: Natil, a four billion year old elf meets a young carpenter who challenges her faith in the Mother Goddess. May be offensive to some religions. DO NOT read if you are easily offended by religious differences and beliefs. Crossover with Strands of Starlight, but can be read simply as an ancient pagan having her faith challenged.


**Author's Note:**_ My second story in the Strands series, combined with Christian mythology. This time, it is about Natil. She's traveling alone when she meets a human carpenter, who, for the first time in her four billion years, makes her question her Goddess. One religion meets another. It is NOT meant to offend anyone. If it does, I'm sorry. We all have different beliefs._

_**The Carpenter**_

The heat of the desert made the Elf pull her grey-green cloak even more tightly about her. She had seen in the pattens that this was the journey to make, and so she had. If the Lady wanted her here, then she was supposed to be here. Why in this land, though? The people were poor, sick. Sadness spread throughout this town.

She'd heard the people talking. Languages she did not really understand, not at first, until her Elven ability to understand all languages filtered them, but the town...the town was called...what? Nasira? No, Nazareth, in Galilee. That was what most of them called it.

What the kind, but sad, woman who had greeted Natil when she had first entered the town had called it. The woman's blue eyes had sparkled with brilliant sunlight and her nearly-perfect skin shimmered with a golden sheen that looked almost Elven. Her blue robes reminded Natil of the Lady.

Natil shook off her encounter with the woman and continue through the heated streets, jostled here and there, leered at by some of the men. Natil steeled herself and found her stars.

_Starlight, Elthia. Lady, why have you sent me here? To this town of infinite sadness? _No answer, but she hadn't gone to the Lady, simply asked a question in her mind. She could read the Dance, but...in a way, that was almost cheating. She was meant to be here.

A soft touch on her shoulder made her jump. Odd, no one got the jump on an Elf. At least, not usually. It was a young man, he was dirty and carrying carpentry tools, his face flushed behind his light beard.

"My lady? You look...tired and lost. My mother and I would give you sanctuary. Please." The young man held out his hand. Natil looked at it, not without some confusion. Most men only wanted one thing. Who was to say that this young carpenter was not simply going to try and bed her and be done with her?

"I won't. I'm not like other men here. I would never take advantage of a lady. Even if I were to, you are not a lady I could take advantage of, are you?" He smiled. Glimmering. His smile was soft, warm. Filled Natil with the same warmth she felt in the presence of the Lady.

That disturbed her. She almost felt that the man's smile was akin to being held in the arms of the Lady. No human had ever had that effect on an elf. Natil trembled slightly. The Lady wasn't here. The Lady wasn't in this sad town of Nazareth, this heated desert. The man's eyes had no starlight in them...did they? Natil risked a glanced back up at the young carpenter.

Sunlight. Not starlight. No infinite night sky glittered in his eyes. Only sparkling sunlight, likely reflecting off the carpentry tools and into the man's eyes. The Dance. The Dance was closed on this man...? She couldn't pull up the futures, the potentials, for this man.

There was no doubt he was human. His dark, mussed, dirtied hair was tucked behind his perfectly circular human ears. His skin was tanned, human, warm. Not the sleek, pale, starlit Elven skin she had been so used to. And yet...she was forcibly reminded of the woman she had met when she first entered the town.

"I...forgive me, sir, your mother...was she the woman, robed in blue, with blue eyes? She greeted me when I entered the town." Natil's voice was hesitant, almost frightened. Why would the Lady send her here? To meet this human carpenter who was closed to the Dance?

The young man smiled again and knelt before the Elfmaid. "Her name is Mary. She is a good woman. We will feed you. House you until your...mission, or whatever brings you here, is complete. Come to our house." One of the carpenter's hands found it's way to Natil's shoulder and squeezed.

The Elf felt a wave of warmth, of comfort, of infinite love, flow through her. Here, for some reason, she felt as safe and loved as she felt in the presence of the Lady. Who WAS this young carpenter, to come to her like this? To cause such a...lack of futures...in the Dance?

Still...if this was the Lady's will...so be it. "Yes. Yes. I...I will...thank you, good sir. Hand of the Lady be on you, sir." She murmured this last as a long-learned habit, but hadn't expected any response like the carpenter's.

"Yes. I'm sure Her hand will be. Her hand upon us all. And His too. Come, now, my mother and a good meal await you."

He took Natil's hand gently, and led her back to the area where she had seen the blue-robed woman, and into a rather shoddy looking house, not at all like those glittering, golden temples she had seen elsewhere. Temples to some God. A God that didn't exist. Only the Lady existed. This Natil knew, with utter certainty. Seeing, feeling, touching, loving.

The young man eyed her a bit before leading her into his mother's home, almost as if he knew her thoughts. His sunlit eyes were almost laughing at her.

"Mother, this is...well, she has yet to tell me her name, actually." He laughed. It was a warm laugh, once again filling her with the same love she felt in the arms of the Lady.

"Mistress, my name...is Natil. I am...I am...just a traveling harper. I...came here because I was asked of it by my Lady." She did not say that her Lady was a four billion year old Elven Goddess. The humans likely took it to mean simply a noble or some such.

"Don't worry. If you are here, then you were meant to be here. That's all you need to tell me, Natil." This from the woman. Her eyes were such a beautiful, deep blue that Natil almost thought she was looking into the eyes of the Lady for moment.

If the woman's eyes had been grey, Natil would not have been able to resist the urge to ask if this woman knew the Lady. This woman...something about her was almost...what? Sacred? Holy? Natil had never used those words, except in reference to the Lady.

A small loaf of bread was pressed into the Elf's hands by Mary. Natil glanced warily at the bread. It looked overcooked and had odd chunks in it. This was a poor city. A poor house. The people who lived here, the carpenter and the woman, lived in near-poverty. She shouldn't have expected a well-made loaf of bread. Still, she was hungry. The Elf tore the bread in half.

She tore off a small piece and licked her lips. She glanced at the woman, who was smiling, obviously thinking she was doing the very hungry elf a favor with this stale bread. Natil slipped the small piece of bread into her mouth, and nearly dropped the rest of the loaf in shock. It was the best bread, no the best food, she had ever tasted. It was soft and fresh, almost warm. Far from the stale thing she held in her hands.

She glanced up at the woman and young man, startled.

The young man smiled. "Good, isn't it? Mother's bread is wonderful. We have very little, but we make due." His lips twitched. "You would be surprised with how much you can get out of so very little, if only you have some faith. Good things multiply, if only one believes they do."

Natil tore hungrily into the rest of the bread, devouring the loaf, hunger from being in the desert for so long nearly overtaking her. A skin of water was pressed in to her hand by the young man. It felt warm. Of course, water couldn't be expected to be cold in the heart of a desert. Natil wasn't putting anything past this odd young man, though.

She popped the cork off the waterskin and drank, ignoring her instincts to first at least examine the water. It was, as she should have expected, cold as ice and refreshing as she could hope for. She drank and drank, until the skin was empty. She gasped as the icy water reached her nearly-empty stomach and melded with the warm bread.

"I...I am...thank you. That was...delicious. I could not have hoped for a more refreshing meal. Thank you. I do not know how I can repay you. I could...I could pay you, I could harp for you, earn money to pay for the food and water. I know meals are scarce in a town like this..." Natil trailed off.

The young man, who's name she still did not know, smiled. "Less scarce than you may think, lady harper. I wouldn't say no to hearing your music, however. I saw your harp. I have never seen it's like before. What is it made of?"

_You will never see it's like again. It was Made with Hands of starlight. The very same Hands that shaped me. That shaped us all. The harp strings are made of strands of starlight. The wood, the wood of life. Wood that is over four billion years old. I cannot explain._ Natil did not share her inner monologue with her audience however. She licked her lips, wishing Mirya were here to sing with her, Talla to dance with her, to share the shimmering, gleaming, universe-altering music of song, dance, and harping with these so-kind people.

Still...she unwrapped her harp, plucked softly at the strands that never wavered, that never once sang wrong. The Elf closed her eyes and began to play a song of healing. Healing for this town of sadness, for these poor people who could not even afford to buy their own bread. As her hands moved across the harp strings, she felt the lambent sheen that accompanied her playing spread across her skin. She momentarily wondered what the humans would think, but was quickly lost in the music of the Goddess.

A brighter star than all the others sparkled in her vision, gleaming, pulsing in tune with her music. In the corner of the starry night sky that was the vision of an Elf, an almost nova-like sun shone. This was new. This was odd. Still, the Elf did not stop her playing. The harping took on a different tone. Instead of healing, she could only describe the music as...blissful. Happiness. Happiness and healing came from the music of her harp, and the stars...and the odd, brilliant sun in her peripheral star-vision.

The ancient Elven song, altered here in this one moment by forces Natil could not identify, came to an end. The Elf opened her eyes, her own skin was shining, gleaming with moonlight and the starlight flowing from her eyes played off the reflection in the cracked glass of a shattered mirror. The Elf risked a glance at the humans. Her people had been persecuted ever since this new God had come to worship. Would these two send her to the stake? Would they take money, money for a new house, a place in a temple to this other God, in exchange for turning an Elf over and sending her to the stake?

The young man's own eyes were gleaming, but not with starlight. They shone like a brilliant sun, like the sun she had seen within the stars, at the edge of the night sky. The young man knelt before Natil. The harper swallowed.

"Am I to head to the stake, sir? I harped, as you asked. And I am an Elf, as you saw. I was shaped by the Lady. I am She, as She is me. If I am to go to the stake, it is the Will of my Lady. I am here by Her Will." Natil bent her head.

She could not alter the patterns, since this young man seemed immune, so there was no escape if they called the God-worshipers. A soft hand pressed against her head, stroking her hair back softly, exposing the Elf's eyes, from which starlight was still flowing.

"...beautiful. Your song was beautiful. It touched me, right here, lady Elf." The young man placed a hand over his heart. "Such beauty, such...healing...why would anyone send such as you to the stake, for any reason? An Elf...I knew, when I first met you. I could see the stars within you, see the hand of the Lady upon you. Elthia Calasiouve...Your Mother gave you a great gift. Your harping is a true gift of Elthia."

He kissed her softly on the brow, beard tickling her pale, shining forehead slightly. Natil's heart was pounding. How...how did this human know of the Lady, and her secret Elven name, Elthia Calasiouve...tears welled in her eyes, threatened to spill over.

"Your Lady isn't the only one Who gives life. Elthia is the Goddess, the Lady, of the Elves, and even some humans. Not all humans are the children of the Goddess, however. My Father is my Lord God, Who called forth the Light at the beginning of time, the Light that helped your Mother shape this world and bring you into being. My Lord Father knows your Lady Mother. Until the end of time, we are one. Humans and Elves. God and Goddess." The carpenter squeezed her hand and helped the Elf to her feet.

Natil's head was spinning. Who _was _this young man? How did he know the Elven Lady? How did he know She made Elves, and helped shape humanity? That Her hand was the hand that shaped the universe...but apparently with the help of this mysterious father God, who called forth the light to help the Mother's creation?

Adria, her home, her forest, shaped and given to her and her family by the Lady. The Lady got the Elves through their billions of years. Humans lived short lives, but why? Was that, too, a gift of the Lady? The Lady had never told her. Had merely smiled and put her finger to her lips in silence.

"Humans die because we are meant to. Elves go on forever, eventually fading, but humans...we move on to eternity, to a place of true happiness. Or we truly move on, to a place the Elves could only dream of. Humans have a gift, but most are afraid of it. Death is our gift, Lady Elf." The young man was stroking her shining hair.

Death, a gift? She had always, even though she healed and helped as needed, looked down upon humans for their short, short life spans. Never had she considered death a gift. A true...escape...from this world.

Natil hesitated. "I...I do not understand, sir. How is..."

The young man pressed his lips against her head, peace and love flowing through her again, as if she were in the arms of the Lady.

"Come with me, Lady Elf." He took her hand and pulled her to her feet, leading her out of the small house. Her eyes met Mary's for a short moment. She saw a starlit night, felt an eternal love, and saw a flash of blue-silver. Natil shook her head, trying to clear it. When she looked back, Mary was just Mary. A kind human mother who had given her sanctuary.

The young man led her through the small town, past the beggars, the lepers, the sad and bleeding children of the God who was not the Lady. He sat down on the side of the street, in the dust and grime, near a particularly pathetic-looking beggar.

The beggar eyed them, or tried to, since he was obviously blind in both milky eyes. "Eh, wot are ya doin'? This 'ere be my spot! Go an' beg somewhere else an' take ya whore with ya'! Ah ken smell her stinkin' womanly scent all a'way from 'ere!" The beggar tried to give the young carpenter a shove.

The carpenter just stroked the man's cheek softly and said what Natil herself had repeated many times, to many people, her own and humans. "Be at peace." The young man's hand trailed down to the beggar's empty food and water basket.

He cupped his hands over both of them. The beggar blinked in astonishment as he lifted what was now a full waterskin and an entire loaf of fresh bread. Instead of screaming about sorcery and running, the beggar put his head to the ground and muttered 'My Lord' before standing and moving on, tears streaming down his face. He moved through the crowd as if he'd never been blind in his life. His milky eyes shone a lovely dark brown. Natil could only gape. No human had such powers of healing and creation. None.

The Elf stared up at the young man, astonished. He smiled back at her, that warm, healing smile full of light, but not the familiar starlight of her kin.

"Be at peace, yourself, dear Elf. It is nothing. Merely...an act of kindness. Isn't that what we all strive for, in the end? Healing, love, kindness, peace?" It didn't seem like a question, coming from his lips, but a promise.

"Humans are not capable of such things, sir. I have...I have seen the humans you call sorcerers. They are nothing more than charlatans. People who think they have Elven power but do not. People who have heard of our powers and think they can imitate them through sheer force of will. Or those who think they really do have our powers. You aren't...forgive me, are you human?" Natil swallowed.

The man was not an Elf. She knew all her kin. All of them. By face, by name, by the touch of the patterns, the strands of starlight, and this man was not a part of them. Even the human witches, the ones who really did have magic, had Elven blood, and this man had not a speck of it. His blood was pure. Far purer than any human she had ever encountered. Almost as if he were the essence of humanity itself. Almost as if...as if HE were the Father God.

The man picked up the blind man's stick and drew a symbol in the sand, a symbol that faintly resembled a star. Her star. The same star on the clasp of her cloak.

"Human? I am...perhaps more human than any other. I feel the pain they feel. I see their violence, their hatred of each other, their inability to sometimes love...but I can't help but love them myself. And forgive them." He traced the stick in a circle, finishing the design on her clasp with the crescent moon.

The Elf ran a finger gently over the lines the man drew in the sand, tracing the familiar moon-and-star symbol. "Forgiveness is not something that you can give. It isn't something you're supposed to...feel given. You can only find forgiveness within."

The young man gave her an odd look, not hostile, but confused, for the first time. "Forgiveness can be found and given. Within, or without. Does your Lady not forgive when you make a mistake?"

Natil shook her head. "She listens. She talks. She comforts...but She has always said that I would find my own forgiveness. It was not in Her power to give."

The man placed a hand gently on her forehead. "Maybe...your Lady is right. Maybe it isn't Her place to forgive everyone. Maybe...someday...you will remember me, and, perhaps, forgive me for this. You can't go from here remembering me."

The Elf looked up. Starlight met sunlight. Those lovely, warm, sunlit brown eyes. "What do you mean, sir? I cannot...?" A wave of starlight rolled through her vision. She collapsed. She looked up, once more meeting the beautiful light-filled eyes of the young man who had changed so much of her thoughts on the Lady.

"Yes. You are needed. Not now. Eventually. And eventually, you will remember. Remember me. And all this. But now is not that time. The Lady needs you, all of you." Starlight once again blinded her.

Natil sank into the stars, floating amongst them before falling into the brightest one, the one that had always called to her. Without knowing what she was really doing, she ran to the Lady and wrapped her arms around Her, sobbing.

"I...my Lady...what was...who...? Please, I don't understand." Natil hugged her Creatrix tighter.

"It is well, child. We have met. Now you have. But He was right. You need not remember. Not now. Go, child. Go from this place, an Elf, now and always, but in the end human. Forgiven." The Lady kissed the Elf and the stars faded.

Natil gasped, waking up near a lake, lit with stars. What had happened? Where was she? All she remembered was the Lady telling her that all was well, and then she was here, near this mirror-like lake, reflecting the stars as if she were within the patterns. But the lake was just a lake.

The Elf stood up shakily, still not understanding, but remembering her Lady. Remembering that all was well, so long as she had the Lady. She walked, past the lake, glanced at the first small, dirty town she approached. Something inside told her to bypass it, and she did. Natil tried to always listen to her instincts.

Some time later, perhaps a very long time, the Elf was not sure. She had revisited her kin, told them of the fruitless mission the Lady had sent her on. Mirya and Terrill had assured her that it was for a reason. Varden and Talla merely smiled, trusting in the eldest of their race to know the Lady and Her reasons best. Natil lay on the forest floor, gazing at the stars, at the patterns flowing through them.

In one strand, humans fought a war. A war over...something. Someone? Her vision was obscured, but she felt the pull of starlight. Once again, she knew she had to go. Perhaps, once again, she would return without her memory, but she knew that she did have to go. _Everything happens exactly as it should, when it should. _

The Elf stole silently into the night and traveled the secret paths, those hidden from human eyes, to reach the battlefield far more quickly than it would have taken a human. The journey was still long, and yet, somehow, for some unknowable reason, it did not take her as long as she believed it should have. Natil reached the city.

Men in armor, with spears, guarded the gates. _Romans._ Her inner voice told her, instinctively. _They'll kill you as soon as they see the starlight on your skin. You mustn't let them see you. _The last voice? Was it hers? Was it the Lady's? It had felt...different. Familiar, but...she had never heard it before, had she? The city...Jerusalem, the patterns told her, was very well guarded. One of the Roman guards shifted uncomfortably. Natil closed her eyes, altering the guards' patterns.

Both of them seemed to have to use the bathroom or get a drink at the same time and quickly slipped away. Natil opened her eyes, sweating and breathing hard from the alteration of the patterns. The Elf slipped through the gates, into the city, and almost gasped at what she saw.

The painful sight before her eyes almost causing her disguise of lambent starlight to fall. She thought one of the soldier saw her, because he shifted and almost headed toward her, before apparently deciding it was nothing more than a glint of sunlight off his armor.

A human man was bound to what appeared to be a wooden stake. _Crucifixion. They call it that. It is how they kill traitors, people who defy their lord God._ That same inner voice spoke to her, telling her of what was happening. Tears streamed down the Elf's face. Her shoulders shook. No one, human or elf, deserved this torture. The man was being beaten, bloodied, stoned. A crown of bloody thorns adorned his head. Nails were drilled into his wrists, holding him to the wooden stake-like thing. His legs dripped blood, trailing along the ground.

Natil caught sight of a woman, crying. Her blue-silver robes were wrinkled and torn, and her eyes were full of tears and Natil could see that she had been crying for days. In so much pain. Those blue, blue eyes were full of such pain and sadness.

Was this, then, the man's mother? She did not look old enough...not nearly, but still, she sobbed with the pain of a mother. Another woman was on her knees in the dirt, screaming with tears streaming from her eyes. She was beautiful. If Natil had to guess, she would think the woman a human prostitute, a woman who sells herself to men, but now, she looked like a...sister. A beautiful woman mourning the torment of the man she loved more than anything. The man's eyes flickered open just a bit...met Natil's for one short moment.

In the midst of the torture and debasement, it almost seemed as if he smiled at her. _Why? Who am I to you? _She wondered why this tormented man would care about her, especially in the middle of his torture. _I forgive them. I die for them. Their sins are forgiven. No one goes from this place with the burden of blame. _That voice...the man's voice. The man was carried out of the city, bleeding. The mob followed. The mother and the sister-like woman had collapsed. Natil almost went to them, to help...to...heal, but something called to her to follow.

The mob left the city, dragged the man through the gates. Natil saw his eyes flicker slightly. Tears trailed down his bloody cheeks. The Elf had the feeling that the tears were not for himself, but for those who were doing this to him. His eyes opened one last time, he cried out, a name...it sounded like 'Father' and his eyes locked with hers again, making her gasp and fall to her knees.

When the Elf recovered from whatever the man had done to her, she looked up, and his body was limp on the crucifix. He was dead. Natil felt tears well. Why? Why was she crying for a man she barely knew? And a human, at that? The Elf turned, going to the man, to heal him, or try, if any life remained. As an Elf, someone who was created to heal, to help, something like this could not be borne. The mob had dispersed, and she was alone.

Once she reached the bloody man on the stake, she reached out, calling on the starlight. _No. Death...is just the beginning, and besides, only one person could ever return the dead to life again, and he is dead._ It wasn't her voice, again, but this man was dead. Natil could feel no life force. No light, starlight or the soft moonlight humans sometimes gave off. His eyes were open. They were a soft brown. Natil reached out a hand, closing them.

That faint touch almost felt as if she had burned herself. It was like a shock. This man was dead, but there was something else...something that made her want to stay with him, with his body. A soft hand on her shoulder jerked her out of her thoughts. It was the woman robed in silver and blue. The motherly woman.

"No. Please. We must go." The woman took Natil by the shoulders and led her away, back into the city. The other woman, the lovely one, met the blue-robed woman at the gates.

"He is gone. I loved him. I loved him, and now he is gone." She sobbed and ran past the motherly woman, to cradle the man's dead body.

The woman, who Natil noticed had brilliant blue eyes, looked at the Elf. "Come with me."

She led Natil away, the Elf stumbled many times before she finally collapsed on a rock. Eleven other people were gathered, as if waiting for something. They were dirty and unkempt, but Natil sensed an innate nobility about them that she could not place.

The blue-robed woman gently placed a hand on her shoulder. "Do not worry. As my son would say, be at peace. Yes, that was my son. Branded traitor, branded heretic, branded...unholy." Tears wet the woman's blue, blue eyes. Starlight flickered in darkness of her eyes, familiar starlight.

"Mother..." Natil whispered. She couldn't place it, but somehow, she knew this woman was also her mother. She was the Mother. The Mother of all, of everything. Natil wrapped her arms around the blue-robed woman and sobbed at the grief she felt toward the tortured human and the torments she had witnessed. The Woman stroked her hair, those hands of immanent divinity, of holiness, filling her with contentment.

"All will be well, child. In but a short time, My Son will rise again. My children will be safe, and forgiven. In the end, we are all one. The Father, the Son, and...the Mother. I am the Mother of the Elves, and even some humans. This special human...you knew him once, but I think you know that already." The Woman kissed her on the head, filling her with comfort. Natil lay down on the rock, the starlight filling her vision, and, at the edge of the stars, sunlight.

Brilliant, glorious sunlight. Sunlight that, in the end, would be the fate of all the children of God and the Mother. Lady Elthia Calasiouve and Lord Jesus Christ.

_My sins. All the healing, helping, all my failures, everything, in the end, forgiven here, because this wonderful human. This Son of God, died for us all. Elves and humans alike._ Natil smiled into the starlight, not seeing the pulsing star that normally pulled her toward it. The Lady, the Mother, was here, with her Son, why would she be amongst the stars? Natil knew, Natil understood. In the years to come, she would never forget this moment. The crucifixion, the sacrifice, and...her Mother. The Lady. And God. Her sins forgiven.


End file.
